A shoe sole is generally required to be light-weight, durable, gripping, shock-absorbing, bendable, etc., and each of these properties needs to be on a certain level or better while some of them are in a tradeoff relationship. In recent years, there has been a demand for better designing the tread surface of a shoe sole and for taking environmental considerations with a shoe sole.
For example, with a trail running shoe, or the like, one solution to increasing the gripping force of cleats is to increase the height of the cleats of the outsole. However, increasing the height of the cleats directly leads to an increase in the thickness of the cleats, which increases the weight. Moreover, with high cleats, upthrust is likely to be felt from cleat areas.